Hope Is The Thing With Feathers -
by charliespike18
Summary: Carrying on from the end of 'Started Early, Took My Dog'. Will Jackson answer Louise's call or not?
1. Chapter 1

_He was about to start the engine when his phone rang. Louise, the screen informed him. Jackson hesitated, imaging what might happen if he didn't answer it. _

_And what would if he did. _

'_Hope' is the thing with feathers – That perches on the soul – And sings a the tune without the words - And never stops – at all – _

_Someone should put out that light, _that was what he had thought while sitting in the Black Swan with Julia all those months ago now. But he just hadn't though it would be him putting out the very last flame, but as he sat in his Saab, he held the fire extinguisher in his hand. _Just press decline Jackson, and end all of this. Press decline, give The Ambassador one of the dog treats that are probably in the glove compartment and drive the 217 miles back to the flat in Covent Garden. Press decline. _

Jackson pressed accept.

"Hello." The Scottish tones of a voice that had been confined to his head for too long rang out.

"Hello," _Really good conversation starter, Jackson. _"Hello," He repeated and realised he was stuck in some Louise-induced loop which only included the word 'hello'. Everything else in his vocabulary had been the victim of some kind of temporary amnesia. The word 'hello', being the only noun remaining, was the only thing he could say - and if Jackson was being honest you couldn't really have a meaningful conversation when all you could say was 'hello'. Thankfully, Jackson - the idea of a conversation just consisting of 'hello' still fresh in his mind; was brought out of this stupor by Louise speaking.

"Um, happy birthday Jackson."

"My birthday was two months ago." He said and it suddenly dawned on him that if his two children had not sent their customary gifts, a hand drawn card from Nathan with ten quid in it – obviously Julia's work - and a mug from Marlee, Jackson's 50th birthday probably would have gone unnoticed. "I know," Louise started. "I forgot." Jackson laughed and so did she and suddenly the whole world looked brighter. That was probably an overstatement or the sun coming out of the clouds but Jackson didn't care - he was smiling like a lunatic at the sound of Louise laughing. "But I remembered, obviously," She continued. "So yeah, happy birthday for two months ago,"

"Thanks, you know for remembering," If Jackson was being honest he didn't know what he was saying, he was making it up at he was going along. "Hey um, yeah thanks, when's your birthday?" He was rambling now, just saying things for the sake of talking, acutely aware that if he stopped, even for a moment, to formulate an idea for what he could say, Jackson would end up professing his undying love for her, and he didn't really think that would go down well.

"It's June 21st," _Jackson, file that somewhere in you small brain and never forget it. Wait, what was it again?_

"Right, I will not forget,"Only a little white lie.

"How are Nathan and Marlee?"

"Nathan's four and Marlee is 14, and they're both fine." He said shrugging, then realised that she couldn't see him shrugging, but in his sudden panic he couldn't think of a word version of a shrug – apart from actually saying "I'm shrugging" – which didn't really have the same affect.

Then he remembered that Louise had two children too, and this sudden realisation stunned him for a second. "Um, how are yours?" He finally said, "Your children, yes how are your children?" He added to clarify.

"Archie's at boarding school, um and Anna is asleep, thankfully at the moment." The idea of Louise with a baby had crossed his mind more times than he anticipated, but he had always dreamt it had been his baby she had. Not some orthopaedic surgeon called Patrick who just happened to be her husband. "How old is Anna?" He asks, as he had forgotten - obviously or he wouldn't be asking.

"Thirteen months, yeah, time flies, all that," She sounded as lost as he did and Jackson had to resist the urge to laugh at that. He knew it was inappropriate.

"Where are you?" A slightly weird question, but he had to know if for some really coincidental reason, she was near Fountains Abbey 561 miles way from her home. Turns out, sadly, she wasn't. "I'm at home,"

"On your own?" Jackson didn't know why that was his immediate response because he highly doubted that Louise would have left a small child on her own. Anyway her husband would be there too.

"Well apart from Anna and the dog yeah, I am" _Oh, I was wrong,_ was the first thought that entered his head, but it was quickly followed by another. _She kept the dog! She kept the dog I gave her! _ "Where are you?" Louise asked and instinctively he looked around him; apart from the dog he was alone - in a car 217 miles from his house. "Sitting in a car at Fountains Abbey with a dog called The Ambassador."

"Oh," She laughed again. "Why is he called The Ambassador?" She asked.

"It's a long story," And that was not an exaggeration. "What's your dog called?" He was expecting Fluffy or Spot or maybe something that wasn't a description like Toby. But he definitely wasn't expecting what Louise said.

"We- I called him Jackson." For once in his life, Jackson didn't know what to say. What could you say? So he just says something completely unrelated, well not completely. "I miss you," He had to say it; the fact she was married with a small child could not stop him missing her. A silence a lot longer than he was anticipating rang out and Jackson felt he might have overstepped the line, but the Louise finally spoke. "Jackson,"

"Yeah?"

"I miss you too, and I'm really so sorry but I think I -" Which is when a high pitched beep rang out and his phone died. Jackson stared down at the black screen, he fiddled frantically with the on and off button on the top of the phone but to no avail – the screen stayed blank. _Crap. Crap. Why had she apologised? Had she done something wrong? _Staring down at the inanimate object Jackson had the desire to throw the phone out of the window, and it was half way down when he realised that it probably wouldn't be the best idea ever. So he resigned himself to hitting the steering wheel, again and again.

…

Julia lived in on the outskirts of York – not exactly the middle of the countryside, but probably as close as Julia had ever been. Jackson had been in the car for an hour and was currently sitting in Julia's drive way. He climbed out of the car and rang the doorbell. While he waited for Julia to open the door, Jackson looked down at his watch and was surprised to see that it was nine o'clock at night. Nathan, he hoped, would be asleep.

Julia opened the door and stared at Jackson, then made a point of looking at her watch to illustrate how late it was. "Nathan's in bed."

"Okay." He said. "I didn't really come here to see him." He added, after a second. It pained him to say so, but if Jackson was being honest Nathan hadn't been his top priority while he was driving to Julia's house.

"That's nice, Jackson." She paused. "Then why are you here? It's not to see me, is it?" Julia sounded vaguely horrified at the idea.

"I need your phone."

"Why the hell do you need my phone? What about you phone?"

"Okay, I need _a_ phone, not yours specifically." He said, plastering a grin on his face, extremely aware that every passing second he spent standing on Julia's doorstep was another second Louise would be waiting for him. He highly doubted she wait forever, or even two hours. "And mine died, during a phone call." He added.

"So whoever you were phoning was quite important or you wouldn't turn up at my door at five past nine at night begging to use my phone." She said, leaning on the door frame and smirking.

"Yep, spot on Julia. Just let me in."

...

Ten minutes later Jackson was stood in Julia's kitchen – which was quite un-Julia as it had barely any decoration at all – with a cup of coffee in one hand and Julia's landline in the other. His phone – thankfully the same make as one Julia had had a few years previously – was plugged in to a charger Julia had supplied and was displaying Louise's details. He dialled her number into the landline – having discovered earlier he had no credit on his phone to make the call he so desperately wanted to.

The first time he rang no one picked up, it just rang to voice mail but Jackson didn't leave a message. He actually wanted to talk to her. The second time was worse - he heard the engaged tone. _Crap, she was phoning someone else._

…

He took the phone away from his ear. In the last few minutes, he had phoned another three times. Twice he had got the engaged tone and the other time it had rung to voicemail again. _Jackson just face it, she doesn't want to talk to you. _He felt the urge to throw his phone again, and as he was about to swear and chuck the phone – Julia's as it was in his hand at this point – across the kitchen when he heard someone talk.

"Daddy?" Nathan was standing at the kitchen door, holding a toy velociraptor and wearing pyjamas to match. "Daddy, what are you doing here?"

"I'm here to tuck you in, Nathan," Jackson smiled.

…

Upstairs, as he sat by Nathan's bed, Jackson watched his son sleep. He couldn't get Louise out of his head. _Don't, stop, do not think about her. You need to move on get over her- _one part of his brain said_ - easier said than done. _Another said. Jackson had his phone in his hand. He scrolled down his contacts until he reached her.

He deleted it.


	2. Chapter 2

"_You should go home, Louise." _

"_So should you."_

_.._

_They should have stayed in the car._ Louise thought. _Driven to god knows where, lived in a caravan – the idea of Jackson in a caravan was very appealing for some reason – and never gone home. They should have made love every night and watched the stars and Jackson would've taught her how to identify the constellations – no one had ever taught Louise and Jackson seem the kind of guy who would know. They would have had two children and moved to a house in Fife and grown old together. _

_Yes, that's what should've happened. _

Instead they'd gone home to their respective partners and never talked to each other again. She'd just gone home – not that it was _really_ her home at all –and back to her husband and to her life. Then she pretended that Jackson had never existed.

Her daughter was called Anna and she'd texted Jackson to tell him this three days after she was born. Louise didn't know what had possessed her to do this but she had. It was the first time she'd called her daughter Anna, in that text to him - she hadn't even told Patrick she'd decided on a name. Jackson always made her make weird decisions.

When she said they'd never talked again she meant they'd never talked about the important stuff again - not that they had ever addressed the really important things is the first place. It was always mundane, everyday things they talked –well texted; they never actually talked – about. Their text conversations about how their respective lives were going happened about once every two months or so. Whenever one of them bothered really. Not bothered, that made it sound like Louise hadn't agonised for days over whether texting Jackson, once just about whether living with no sleep for weeks was a good idea or not.

She'd messed everything up. Every bloody thing. Her marriage was over. Finished. Ended. Terminated. Whichever word you used it still meant the same thing. Patrick had left her – though it had been her that had actually packed up and left the house. Her marriage was broken, irreparably, one morning as she sat eating cereal. _Nothing important had ever happened when someone was eating cereal, _Louise thought. _Mr Darcy hadn't revealed his undying love for Elizabeth Bennett while she ate cereal. Karenin in Anna Karenina had not left his wife while she ate cereal. No, nothing important. Just my marriage ending. No, nothing._

Patrick had just asked her why she was dreaming about the dog. He didn't accuse her of having an affair or ask her about the weird texts on her phone. Just about the dog.

Except she hadn't been dreaming about the bloody dog.

Patrick had told her she'd been talking about Jackson – the dog is his imagination – in her sleep and he had wanted to know what this dream had actually entailed because the snippets he heard had sounded interesting. Louise still didn't actually know what she had said because, after finding out she was dreaming about the dogs hitherto unmentioned counterpart, Patrick had refused to tell her. All she said was " It wasn't the dog, it was the bloke he was named after," Okay, all right, it probably wasn't the _best_ response she could have said – "Oh darling it was so very complicated and would probably bore you to death, more coffee beloved?" Would have been a better response, albeit a sarcastic one - but she had been tired and frustrated and it had sort of just slipped out. She didn't know he'd flip like he did.

He wouldn't stop shouting – it was at this point he did accuse her of having an affair. He called her every name under the sun and told her to leave. So she had, she'd taken Anna, Jackson the dog – sadly not the human version, though Patrick may have had something to do with that - and left.

That was how she founded herself in a hotel in Fife – her and dream Jackson's final resting place. It was just after she'd arrived at her new – probably temporary – home, that she remembered when Jackson's birthday was. He had turned 50th about two months previously. _Why don't you wish him a happy birthday?_ And with that, her phone was in her hand. She wasn't really going to phone him, was she? No of course not, it would probably be the most stupid thing she'd ever done.

So she phoned him anyway. "Hello."

"Hello," His voice rang out loud and clear and so very like she remembered it. She nearly gasped at the fact she had actually made this reckless phone call in the first place. "Hello," For some reason Jackson repeated. There was a small pause and Louise decided to speak.

"Um, happy birthday Jackson."

"My birthday was two months ago." Good of Jackson to point out the obvious. _Stupid idea Louise, you should not have done this. _But hey, she had done it now.

"I know," She started. "I forgot." She added, because she had. And Jackson laughed, the most wonderful sound ever, so she laughed to, even though it wasn't that funny. "But I remembered, obviously. So yeah, happy birthday for two months ago," She was grinning like the cat who got the cream.

"Thanks, you know for remembering" Jackson said, paused and then added. "Hey um, yeah thanks, when's your birthday?" She actually had to think for a moment.

"It's June 21st," The summer solstice. Louise had liked her birthday when she was younger. It was like getting a top up of all the things or money she'd received at Christmas, not that it was much.

"Right, I will not forget," She found his kindness touching, no one had ever remembered her birthday before, not even Archie. Not even she had.

"How are Nathan and Marlee?" She asked, taking the topic away from herself.

"Nathan's four and Marlee is 14, and they're both fine." That was good. She was suddenly reminded of Archie, her little boy who was so far away at boarding school. Her little boy who was not so little anymore.

"Um, how are yours?" Jackson stuttered "Your children, yes how are your children?" She had actually understood the meaning of what he had said from his first sentence, but didn't mind the clarification.

"Archie's at boarding school, um and Anna is asleep, thankfully at the moment." She said, turning to face her daughter, asleep behind her. Louise was praying she wouldn't wake up and start crying. She was so tired. She was brought out of her daughter induced haze by Jackson speaking.

"How old is Anna?"

"Thirteen months, yeah, time flies, all that."

"Where are you?" His reply, so very random, made her walk over to the curtains, open them and scan the street for Jackson. He wasn't there.

"I'm at home," She said, not strictly true, but she could be at home. The house she'd shared with Patrick had never been home, the hotel was a homely as that house had ever been. _And you never know. I might be trapped here for the rest of my life. _She banished that thought as quickly as it had appeared. It was too depressing to even contemplate.

"On your own?" Another random question.

"Well apart from Anna and the dog yeah, I am. Where are you?" For some reason she hoped he would say that he was in Fife, though how he would know she was there she didn't know.

"Sitting in a car at Fountains Abbey with a dog called The Ambassador." _Definitely not weird. No, not at all. _

"Oh." She laughed again. "Why is he called The Ambassador?" Because that was a really bizarre name for a dog.

"It's a long story," Okay, that made it sound quite interesting from where Louise was sitting. But before she could say that she had a long time to wait, Jackson spoke again.

"What's your dog called?" _My dog! How does he know about Jack- oh yeah! How could you have forgotten, he was the whole reason you're in this mess._

"We- I called him Jackson." She waited patiently for his reply. And was not expecting what he said next.

"I miss you," _What? Last I heard_ w_e were talking about a dog. Not our emotions. We don't talk about that._ _Well now's better that never, _she thought.

"Jackson,"

"Yeah?"

"I miss you too, and I'm really so sorry but I think I might love you. I know that it's far, far too late, but yeah." Silence descends on the phone line and Louise feels she might have over stepped the line. Jackson didn't speak, didn't reply to her hear felt admission so she looked down at her phone.

He had bloody hung up on her.

_He heard you admit you loved him and didn't care enough to listen anymore. He bloody hung up on you Louise. Bastard. _

She sat there in her hotel room in Fife trying to get her head around what had just happened. Tears stung her eyes and made her angry. He couldn't even be bothered to hear her out, he wasn't worth crying over. Yet she still felt the first tear slide down her face. She wiped it away as fast as it had appeared but it had still been there, a testament to how she felt about Jackson Brodie.

She had waited too long. It was her fault after all, she was the one who had tried to move on – though move on from what she wasn't quite sure, they hadn't exactly broken up, or been together in the first place. It wasn't like he was going to wait forever. _Especially not for you. _

She hated him, how could one man do this to her. Patrick leaving her hadn't done this – it had even, she loathed admitting – had been relief when he told her to get out. Jackson Brodie was the one person on the whole planet that Louise hated and loved in equal measure.

Louise phoned him back. He didn't pick up and she decided she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of hearing her confess her love for him in a recorded message. She wasn't going to beg him. Yet she phoned him again anyway. And again, and again. By this point she was so frustrated at him she was seriously contemplating throwing her phone across the room, but that would probably wake Anna up and Louise really didn't want that.

…

She was nearly asleep, her head in her hands as she sat at the small desk in the hotel room, when her phone rang. She snatched it up like it was the Holy Grail and she needed it to live.

"You bastard. You absolute bastard," She said, as she realised that she was talking to Patrick.

"Excuse me, Louise?" He replied, the epitome of calmness. _Damn Patrick and his calmness. _

"Um, sorry, I thought you were someone else." She said, embarrassed at the lows Jackson Brodie had dragged her to.

"Okay." Patrick hesitated. "I just wanted to ask if I could see Anna tomorrow." He continued.

"Yeah, yeah of course. She misses you."

"She's 13 months old Louise, I doubt it." She nearly laughed, but there was something in the remark that reminded her of Jackson and she was suddenly depressed again.

"How's your boyfriend?"

"My what?" She stuttered. "What makes you think I have a boyfriend?"

"Because you're in love with the man who you named our dog after. If I was you, the first thing I'd do was get with him. This bloke, whoever he is, ended our marriage. I wouldn't be surprised if you were together before we ended things." Her estranged husband replied, petulantly. _This bloke ended our marriage! This bloke! You bloody ended it yourself Patrick._

"I wasn't having an affair, Patrick. He doesn't feel the same way. Okay?" She felt the tears trying to mount a mutiny and ended her phone call to Patrick quickly, not giving him time to reply.

About half an hour later her phone rang again and this time she picked it up at a leisurely pace. There was no way she was repeating her mistake a second time.

"Hello, this is Julia Land speaking." Who the hell was Julia Land?

"Um, hello? This is DCI Louise Monroe." The random woman who had phoned her at - she looked at the clock on the TV - eleven o'clock at night, made a noise like she'd suddenly realised something. "Who are you? How do you know me?" Louise asked and Julia – who ever she was – replied almost instantly.

"I know Jackson Brodie," She said, as if she was certain Louise would recognise this name – which, of course, she did. But how the hell this Julia woman would know this, Louise didn't know.

"How do you know him?" Louise said.

"He's the father of my son." Though why Louise had to know this she wasn't quite sure.

"Are you an actress?"

"Yes." _Nathan's mother. Must be, but why the hell does she want to speak to me?_

"How do _you_ know him?" Julia asked.

She had absolutely no idea how to answer this question. She was saved from answering the question because Anna started crying. She walked over to her daughter, picked her up and started rocking her. This seemed to quieten her down.

"Sorry Julia, my daughter's thirteen months and quite temperamental." Louise had no clue why she was divulging this information to a stranger, but she was.

"Is she Jackson's?" Why would she think that? Did Jackson discuss her with Julia? "I only ask because Nathan's older sister, Marlee – she's fourteen and doesn't really get to see him much but he loves the company. He'd love more siblings." Louise got the feeling it wasn't quite the only reason she was asking.

"No." She paused, before adding. "Of course not."

"Okay," Julia replied. "So, how _do_ you know him?"

"I don't, not anymore." It was the truth. "I've really got to go. I'm very busy. So bye." She placed her phone down on the counter and stared at it. Well that wasn't weird, was it? Then she decided on something. She didn't know Jackson anymore, not really. Had she ever? So she scrolled down her contacts until she reached Jackson's name.

And she deleted it.


	3. Chapter 3

_After great pain, a formal feeling comes – _

_First – Chill – then stupor - then letting go – _

Emily Dickinson. Jackson had become a lot more whimsical and poetic since he was involved in the train crash. Julia would say he'd become more sensitive but Jackson preferred to use more manly words when it came to his own demeanour. He was currently sitting in his car driving up the A69 with Julia sitting next to him and Nathan and The Ambassador in the back seat.

He'd spent the night at Julia's because she'd blackmailed him into staying. She had told it was far too late for him to drive back to London – it had been 11.37 exactly, not too late in Jackson's opinion. But she had trumped any of his protestations by telling Jackson she wouldn't've been able to live with herself if she'd let Jackson drive away and he had ended up dead in some pile-up somewhere. "How could I explain to our son that I'd let you drive off to your death, Jackson?" She had said, in a melodramatic way that was just typical Julia.

Despite this he still wasn't sure how he'd been roped in to Julia's plan to take Nathan to Hadrian's Wall. He was just going to go home, but at breakfast she'd announced her plans to take them on the drive to Cumbria. Nathan had seemed so excited, apparently this week's obsession was the Romans and Julia wanted him to be a cultured young man. He was four.

But however the decision had come about they were still driving to Cumbria. He'd spent the whole time trying to ignore Julia's interrogation. She kept pressing him to tell her who the person he had turned up at her house to phone was. Jackson just kept refusing to tell her about Louise. If he was being honest it hurt too much to even think about.

He messed it all up, all by himself. _Well done Jackson, you lost her all by yourself. _She didn't want to talk to him and he didn't blame her, from her perspective it would look like he hung up just as she was saying – saying what? Jackson didn't know. He guessed he'd never know.

…

Louise Monroe was tired. After Jackson's phone call the previous night, she barely slept at all. All the reason why he would've hung up on her without saying a word were rushing around her head. But in the end she'd decided that people are people and are allowed to change their mind. Even Jackson. About her.

Damn, she'd promised herself that she would ever think about him ever again. _Well done Louise, you managed all of about eight hours._ Today was about Anna – she was going to meet Patrick down in Carlisle because he was currently of secondment there. He was her daughter's father and whatever the state of their relationship Anna would be allowed to see each parent on a regular basis. She just hadn't really wanted to drive down to Carlisle. Yet she'd gone. She'd taken the dog too, as she hadn't wanted to leave him in the hotel all alone for the day.

She missed her cat. Good old Jellybean – now long dead. She had missed him a lot last night. Archie too. He had suddenly seemed a lot further away. He was growing up and Louise was missing it. She wouldn't miss a moment of Anna growing up. Of that Louise was certain. She was aware that Patrick wanted sole custody of their daughter, he'd mentioned it the last time they'd met the solicitor. She didn't care how much money he took from her, he was not having her daughter. _Over my dead body_.

Jackson Brodie somehow returned to her mind, like he always did in the end. The bastard. Why couldn't she just get over it, he obviously didn't care anymore – if indeed he had in the first place. Didn't stop her missing him – thought it really should if she thought about, but then she never had thought about Jackson too much, too deeply._ That didn't mean anything, did it? No, nothing. Nothing at all, Louise._

…

Jackson stretched his legs. They'd finally arrived at Hadrian's Wall. Via, though, three trips around one roundabout, about half an hour away, because Julia was shouting directions that he couldn't understand. It had been like that all the way really.

Nathan was running about pretending to be a Roman solider and Julia was buying the tickets for their 'family' outing. He was keeping a close eye on his son, but he was alone – properly alone for the first time since he'd tried to call her back. He'd left his phone at Julia's house to charge. He didn't really feel like talking to anyone, not even Julia but that was unavoidable. He had The Ambassador – his only friend – there too, but he wasn't really good at conversations because he was a dog.

Jackson was what Louise had called her dog. He smiled at that, and then grimaced at the memory of her. The pain was still too fresh. He idly wondered, as he let the Ambassador run off, if he'd feel like this forever, if it would always feel like it happened yesterday. God, he hoped not.

…

Patrick had decided that they'd meet on neutral ground. Which was good because Louise hadn't really wanted to go to his new place – he shared it with three other doctors, as he was on a secondment. It had been Louise that had suggested Hadrian's Wall and Patrick had agreed, which was quite rare these days.

That was how she found herself queuing for tickets while Patrick had some 'bonding' time with Anna. Bollocks. He just hadn't wanted to queue. A blonde haired woman who looked had a face that Louise thought she vaguely recognised was standing in behind her, helped her when she dropped the contents of her purse on the floor while trying to pay. _Whoo_,_ this is really going well, Louise!_ She got out of there as fast as possible, muttering thanks to the blonde woman. _  
_

Patrick was waiting with the dog and Anna when she returned from the ticket office. They had barely said anything to each other in the twenty minutes since they'd arrived and Patrick didn't look like he would be happy to change this.

She found her mind wondering back to the forbidden territory of Jackson again. And this time she let her self fantasise what it would be like if she had been here with him instead of Patrick. When she looked round again she thought she had seen him, but she quickly dismissed it as figment of her imagination.

…

"Can I have a cream tea, a piece of chocolate cake and an Americano please." The girl on the till replied with something that sounded surprisingly like 'do you like tall?" and he guessed that wasn't actually what she had said – unless they had their own special code in Cumbria. He nodded, unsure of what he'd actually agreed to. But nodding seemed to have worked and the girl started inputting his order in to the screen in front of her. Nathan and Julia were trying to find a seat – quite a task in what seemed like the busiest café in the country.

He paid Maria, or at least that was what her badge said, and moved along the conveyer belt to wait for his order. He was adding milk to Julia's Americano when he thought her heard a voice that sounded like Louise, so close it made him look up and scan the café for her. _Idiot, she's in Scotland with her husband. You must have imagined it. Of course you did, it's not like she's here. _

…

Louise stood outside the café staring in at the mass of people that had congregated inside. Patrick had seemed insistent that they start with a coffee. He was avoiding the queue with Anna again. More 'bonding' bollocks.

For a moment Louise thought about running back to her car and driving away but soon realised what a stupid idea that was. She should get Anna, then run to the car and drive away. But where would she go? _Home, I'd go home, but where is home? They said home is where the heart is. No mention of where home is if you feel like your heart has been ripped out by a bastard who wouldn't even hear you out. Was it with him, because if he'd taken her heart, according to that saying her home was with him? _ Louise decided she didn't care what they said.

She ventured in to the throng and joined the back of the queue._ Yippee, another queue! _She was about half way towards the till, quite near the milk and condiments when a man tried to push in in front of her. She told him to go to the back and may or may not have mentioned the fact she was a police officer. It was safe to say he got the message.

…

Julia was holding on to Nathan's hand like she was drowning and he was a life line. Olivia had been six when she'd had gone miss-, Julia corrected her self – died. She wasn't going to let Nathan out of her sight. In her other hand, she was holding the leash that attached itself to The Ambassador. She nabbed a table just as its occupants were leaving and sat down and tethered the dog to the table leg.

A man, holding a baby girl and a leash with a dog on the end, came passed looking for a seat and Julia was reminded of Nathan at that age. He had been so beautiful. So little. He'd never be a baby again, she thought sadly. The baby girl dropped her teddy and Nathan, a boy of impeccable manners, picked it up and handed it over to the man.

"Thank you very much, young man," He said, Nathan just nodded and sat down again. Which was when the man's dog took an interest to The Ambassador and he had to drag it away, calling it something suspiciously like 'Jackson'. Coincidences 'ey.

…

Louise lay in her bed in her hotel room in Fife. Patrick had told her about the meeting with the woman in the café garden, and Louise said that it sounded like the woman who helped her pick up her change in the ticket office. Patrick had started waffling about coincidence and Louise remembered what Jackson had told her. Coincidences are just explanations waiting to happen.

She had resisted the urge to call him three times since she had returned to the room, even though she didn't have his number. Louise knew how to get round this though; she'd just look in call history as she hadn't deleted that. His number would still be there.

Instead she read Anna 'The tiger Who Came to Tea' and 'The Hungry Caterpillar' Both books she had from when Archie was little. She fell asleep at the same time as Anna. She was thinking about Jackson again. Louise really hoped the pain that she associated with him would go away. Yeah, she doubted it.

…

Jackson returned to his flat in Covent Garden at eight o'clock. He hadn't been back in a while and had a large amount of post waiting for him when he arrived. Instead of doing the sane think and picking up the post, Jackson went to check his answer machine, just in case Louise had called here. She hadn't.

Jackson left the post on the mat and climbed in to the shower. When he came out he was ready to fall asleep on his feet. In vain to try and keep awake, he tried to watch the news but in the end, fell asleep to Bill Turnbull reading the headlines. He was thinking about Louise again. Jackson really hoped the pain that he associated with her would go away.

_After great pain, a formal feeling comes – _

_First – Chill – then stupor - then letting go – _


	4. Chapter 4

_Pain has an element of blank,_

_It cannot recollect,_

_When it began, or if there were_

_A day when it was not._

Louise was dreaming about fish. It was quite a weird dream if she was being honest. Large, human sized salmon were running about for no particular reason. Louise was shouting at them, telling them to get in to some kind of order – what order she wasn't quite sure - height, shades of pink, swimming ability? This bizarre gathering of fish and human was occurring in some kind of hall. It had purple walls and a display about the Queen in one corner. Louise was aware that the salmon had to get in order before something important happened. This being a dream, she wasn't quite sure what it was. It was as fish – who, for some reason, she knew was called Hector - called, in a cockney voice – Louise wasn't quite sure why her salmon were from the rough end of London – that it was raining, which it obviously wasn't, that another human entered the hall. It was Jackson.

Louise woke with a start. She was in the hotel room in Fife, but for a moment she could have sworn that she had been in the Hatter Homes house that had been her home for so long. She had lived there before everything went wrong; before she had met Jackson and Patrick and she'd sent her little boy to Fettes and her life had had some semblance of normality.

She lay, staring at the ceiling in the dark, for quite a while, her eyes quickly adjusting to the darkness. Louise was thinking about the moments that had changed her life. If she was being honest there weren't that many, she could list them all almost on one hand. When she'd slept – though that wasn't quite the right word for it, because there was no sleeping involved - with Michael Pirie in the back of his police car. When her son had been born. The moment she first met Jackson Brodie and thought of him as some lunatic making up a dead girl for attention. Marrying Patrick. When Anna appeared in the world. Divorcing Patrick. And that was it, everything of note that had ever happened in her adult life.

It seemed so small and insignificant if you thought of it like that. If she died right there, right at that very moment who would remember her? Archie, Patrick? She wasn't close to anyone at work. Anna wouldn't remember her. Jackson wouldn't even care. Archie and Patrick. The only two people who would notice her slipping away in to oblivion. _What a cheerful thought, Louise. _But in the end she would be forgotten just like most of the people who had lived on the Earth had been. Only a hand-full were immortalized by fame. Not her, not Louise Monroe. No, she'd be forgotten. Not immediately, no, just slowly over time – first, it would be the way she sounded, then the way she smiled, and soon after when someone thought of her, they would only be able to see a vague outline, never able to see all the features clearly. Until, at some point someone would say her name, or see it written somewhere and they would go '_I wonder who she was'_ because there would be no one left who'd know, no one who'd remember.

That's how it was for most people, doomed to be forgotten.

…

Jackson was on a train. He wasn't _actually_ on a train because he was really asleep in his bed but dream Jackson was on a train. He was sitting in one of those old trains that wouldn't seem out of place in Agatha Christie's '_Murder on the Orient Express'_. He was distinctly aware that he needed the toilet, so dream Jackson stood and walked over to the small cubicle. He opened the door and suddenly saw a dead body. His lost girl from the Firth of Forth all those years ago.

In the blink of the eye the girl was gone and Jackson was standing by the train door, and it had stopped moving. On the floor next to him was a pile of plates with dogs on them. A man, who had just appeared from the carriage, picked one up and opened the window. The man suddenly transformed into Francis. He threw the plate out of the train's window, towards the grassy embankment opposite the stationary train. Niamh appeared behind Jackson and proceeded to follow her brother's lead. Jackson – feeling left out – picked a plate up and watched it smash on the grass. They continued to do this for some time. Until the train started to move and Niamh opened the door and jumped out. Francis and Jackson followed a moment later.

Now they were running across a field, having miraculously survived their suicidal jumps from a speeding train. They were sprinting like their lives depended on it. Jackson felt happy, his sister in front of him, his brother behind. His family was reunited. Niamh, up a head, stopped running and turned around to face him. Except she wasn't his sister anymore. Louise Monroe stared back at him.

Jackson was lying in bed, contemplating his unusual dream. It was weird, to think of Niamh and Louise in the same sentence. The only two women – though Niamh hadn't really been a woman, just a girl, a little girl – he had ever loved. Truly loved. He guessed losing his mother, sister and brother in quick succession was what made him the person he was today. He ignored the obvious thought, that the pain, horrible and excruciating, of losing Niamh all those years ago was the reason he could never tell Louise he loved her; the fact he couldn't bear to lose somebody he loved the same way he had lost his sister. He hadn't wanted to suffer such unbearable pain again, much better to have never had her than to risk losing her like that.

He missed Niamh so much. She had been buried in the cold harsh earth for over forty years now. He didn't know how so much time had passed; it seemed just like yesterday that the police officer had told them the dreadful news, yet it was so long ago. He had changed so much yet remained the same.

Sometimes he still felt like the little boy, searching for his lost girl.

…

Joanna Hunter was dead.

She was 39 years old. A life taken far too soon.

She had been driving her car, when a drunk driver had swerved out in front of her. She didn't die on impact and was still alive when the paramedics got to her. She'd told them to tell her son his mummy loved her.

Louise had found all of this out because she had a friend in the traffic department. _Good old Hannah Tate, I knew suffering through your hen night was for something. _It had wrong footed her to start with, someone who everyone thought of as lucky, the lucky the little girl who miraculously survived the Mason massacre because she had run, and had been running, really, ever since, was dead. But the way Louise looked at it, Joanna Mason wasn't lucky, no, much better to have died with the rest of her family than to spend the rest of your life being the 'lucky' girl. _Nice Louise, always the optimist._

Gabriel was three years old - he had started nursery the previous September, happy and excited for the future. The future that stole his mother from him before he really ever knew her. So much of Gabriel's life – just like Joanna's before him – would be witnessed by everyone but the most important person, his mother. The morning she died – Hannah, her friend in traffic, had told her – Gabriel had asked if they could finish their puzzle, his mother had said they could do it that evening, when she got home from work. It was the first thing Gabriel had mentioned when his father had explained to him what had happened, "But Mummy has to help me finish my puzzle." The trouble was everyone always though they would have more time than they really did.

…

Jackson had learnt of Joanna Hunters death from a letter. It had been one of the many letters on the mat when he returned from his sojourn to Leeds. His address on the front was written in handwriting he hadn't recognised. He had ripped open the envelope and unfolded the letter. The words helped him ascertain who the author was. 'Hello this is Reggie Chase,' was in fact the first line.

She told him that she doubted, yet hoped, that he would remember her and added a helpful resume of where she had fitted in to his life. '_I'm the girl who saved your life at the train crash in Edinburgh and you then helped me find Joanna Hunter_.'

She told him about the circumstances of her death – a car crash, drunk driver, nothing anyone could have done to help – a story Jackson had heard hundreds of time before. But not to someone he knew, somehow the people he knew were untouchable by death. He'd always thought that because he'd seen so much death as a child the Grim Reaper had taken pity on him and never taken any one he had, for want of a better word, cared about. Joanna Hunter had seen death as a child – had stared it the face in fact. Death had taken her too early. But Jackson knew only too well that life wasn't fair.

He hadn't seen Joanna again after he'd watched her walk into her house. He'd read about her of course, in the papers, but never talked to her again. Is that how it would be for Louise – that he wouldn't see her again until he saw the picture next to her obituary? He knew he shouldn't let it happen like that - he knew he loved her; he knew he should go to her house and tell her how he felt.

But Jackson knew that it was too late.

…

Louise was standing at the back of the church, her daughter in her arms. She hadn't been in a church for a long time, not since she was a child at least. That part of her life was better off forgotten, though. She had – contrary to what her mother had told her- made something of herself. She was happy, her children were happy. Yes, everything was fine. Except Joanna Hunter was dead and she still, stupidly, foolishly, irrationally loved Jackson Brodie.

Neil Hunter was sitting in the front pew, his son next to him. Gabriel probably didn't understand what was happening and hadn't realized that the words 'Mummy isn't coming back' meant forever and not just for a few days. Reggie, who had invited Louise here, was sitting next to little Gabriel. Reggie, who had lost everybody now, apart from him.

Joanna's death had reminded her of a part of her life that was better of forgotten as well. There were a lot of them in Louise's life, if she was being honest. She was reminded of Reggie and how she'd thought the young girl mad. Of Joanna Hunter mysteriously reappearing out of the blue. Of the Christmas when Jackson Brodie had been part of her life again and she'd nearly told him how she felt. But now it was too late and he didn't care. She watched as Reggie gave an emotional speech, saying words of wisdom and beauty that belied her young years. She watched as Neil Hunter sobbed into a handkerchief, as Reggie spoke. Louise was too busy listening to the young girl's speech, she barely noticed a man slip beside her. She was still looking straight ahead when he took her hand.

…

Jackson knew he was late. The drive from London had been long and he hadn't really thought he'd make it at all. It was only half an hour after he should have arrived, which wasn't too bad. But now, as he got out his car, he wondered why he was here. He lingered outside the door, knowing that he just didn't really want to walk in to the church and invade their grief, that he was using the fact he was late as an excuse. He hadn't been to a funeral since Francis', having avoided all others because he didn't like being reminded of death, of the immediacy and inevitableness of it.

He stepped in to the church, trying not to make much noise and saw Reggie standing by the lectern. She was talking about what a wonderful person Joanna Hunter had been. He also saw the woman standing at the back holding a baby. Louise.

He walked over to her and stared forward at Reggie again. Jackson had the overwhelming feeling to hold Louise's hand.

So he did.


End file.
